Love burlesque? Steampunk? Funky hats? Swing music? Russian baths? General decadence? In our latest episode, I talk with Miss Scorpio, party planner extraordinaire and mistress of Gemini and Scorpio, about 10 years of throwing fabulous themed costume parties, curating one of New York City’s largest underground mailing lists of offbeat cultural events, transforming her loft into A Midsummer Night’s Dream, building your own social network, and why you never want to do dinner and a movie for your internet first date.

Your podcast-host may be a bookish stick-in-the-mud, but his friends aren’t!

Miss Scorpio is the the mistress of Gemini & Scorpio Events. She loves brass bands, circus, and fab hats. Her possibly out-of-date bio tells us, “Miss Scorpio dazzles audiences worldwide with her outrageous wit and wardrobe, constantly shocking the status quo into something more fabulous. She is an attention-getting, opinionated, stylish and intellectual artist who has worked for high-powered design firms and traveled with carnivals & gypsy bands, among many unique life experiences. A brazen Scorpio, she regularly talks to strangers.” You can find more about Miss Scorpio and her events at Gemini & Scorpio, Twitter, Flickr, Facebook, and YouTube. (And why don’t you sign up for her mailing list?)

Credits: This episode’s music is End of the Party by English Beat. The conversation was recorded on a pair of AT2020 mics, feeding into a Zoom H4n recorder. I recorded the other material on a Blue Yeti USB mic into Audacity. All editing and processing was done in Garage Band.